Friday, December 2, 2011

Hidemi's Rambling No.381

Lately, relaxing at the communal spa in my apartment building has been the biggest pleasure for me. I take a hot bath, a Jacuzzi and a sauna first thing in the morning and also in the evening. But as usual, it’s housewives with kids that spoil my pleasure. Especially the one with a baby is the worst. I strongly disagree to bring a baby into the spa since it still relies on a diaper and the spa has a stone floor. I’ve often seen a baby slip and fall on the floor, bumping its head. It’s a dreadful sight to me but a mother is usually just laughing at it while the baby is bawling for pain. It even seems a mother tries to make an ear-piercing noise with a baby in the spa on purpose. They let babies shriek and cry all the time in the spa, and crawl around on the locker room floor while they’re drying their hair. It’s sheer madness. Some mother leisurely washes her body by leaving her baby to its five or six-year-old sister. In my opinion, it’s negligence of parental responsibilities and child abuse. Sadly, few feel angry with those senseless mothers. Other residents show great pleasure to see a baby and laugh happily while it’s crying. They look at mothers’ negligence as if it were heartwarming or something. They flock around a baby, laughing frivolously and babbling foolishly. Even a usually grumpy woman with a sullen face who returns hello very unwillingly to me is remarkably amiable to a baby and smiles at it with all her force. To me, a baby is a grotesque alien or a hairless monkey at best. I’m again in the minority here…